The nobel prize.doc

The Nobel Prize1 History Alfred Nobel was born on 21 October 1833 in Stockholm, Sweden, into a family of engineers.He was a chemist, engineer, and inventor. In 1894, Nobel purchased the Bofors iron and steel mill, which he made into a major armaments manufacturer. Nobel also invented ballistite, a precursor to many smokeless military explosives, especially the British smokeless powder cordite. Nobel was even involved in a patent infringement lawsuit over cordite. Nobel amassed a fortune during his lifetime, with most of his wealth from his 355 inventions, of which dynamite is the most famous.In 1888, Nobel was astonished to read his own obituary, titled The merchant of death is dead, in a French newspaper. As it was Alfreds brother Ludvig who had died, the obituary was eight years premature. The article disconcerted Nobel and made him apprehensive about how he would be remembered. This inspired him to change his will. On 10 December 1896, Alfred Nobel died in his villa in San Remo, Italy, from a cerebral haemorrhage. He was 63 years old.Nobel wrote several wills during his lifetime. The last was written over a year before he died, signed at the SwedishNorwegian Club in Paris on 27 November 1895.To widespread astonishment, Nobels last will specified that his fortune be used to create a series of prizes for those who confer the greatest benefit on mankind in physics, chemistry, peace, physiology or medicine, and literature. Nobel bequeathed 94% of his total assets, 31 million SEK (c. US$186 million, 150 million in 2008), to establish the five Nobel Prizes.Because of scepticism surrounding the will, it was not until 26 April 1897 that it was approved by the Storting in Norway.The executors of Nobels will, Ragnar Sohlman and Rudolf Lilljequist, formed the Nobel Foundation to take care of Nobels fortune and organise the award of prizes.Nobels instructions named a Norwegian Nobel Committee to award the Peace Prize, the members of whom were appointed shortly after the will was approved in April 1897. Soon thereafter, the other prize-awarding organisations were designated or established. These were the Karolinska Institutet on 7 June, the Swedish Academy on 9 June, and the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences on 11 June.The Nobel Foundation reached an agreement on guidelines for how the prizes should be awarded; and, in 1900, the Nobel Foundations newly-created statutes were promulgated by King Oscar II.In 1905, the personal union between Sweden and Norway was dissolved. Thereafter, Norways Nobel Committee was responsible for awarding the Nobel Peace Prize and the Swedish institutions retained responsibility for the other prizes2Award processThe award process is similar for all of the Nobel Prizes; the main difference is in who can make nominations for each of themNominationsNomination forms are sent by the Nobel Committee to about 3000 individuals, usually in September the year before the prizes are awarded. These individuals are often academics working in a relevant area. For the Peace Prize, inquiries are sent to governments, members of international courts, professors and rectors, former Peace Prize laureates and current or former members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee. The deadline for the return of the nomination forms is 31 January of the year of the award.he Nobel Committee nominates about 300 potential laureates from these forms and additional names.The nominees are not publicly named, nor are they told that they are being considered for the prize. All nomination records for a prize are sealed for 50 years from the awarding of the prizeSelectionThe Nobel Committee then prepares a report reflecting the advice of experts in the relevant fields. This, along with the list of preliminary candidates, is submitted to the prize-awarding institutions.The institutions meet to choose the laureate or laureates in each field by a majority vote. Their decision, which cannot be appealed, is announced immediately after the vote. A maximum of three laureates and two different works may be selected per award. Except for the Peace Prize, which can be awarded to institutions, the awards can only be given to individuals.If the Peace Prize is not awarded, the money is split among the scientific prizes. This has happened 19 times so far.Posthumous nominationsAlthough posthumous nominations are not permitted, individuals who die in the months between their nomination and the decision of the prize committee were originally eligible to receive the prize. This has occurred twice: the 1931 Literature Prize awarded to Erik Axel Karlfeldt, and the 1961 Peace Prize awarded to UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjld. Since 1974, laureates must be thought alive at the time of the October announcement. There has been one laureate, William Vickrey, who in 1996 died after the prize (in Economics) was announced but before it could be presented. On 3 October 2011, the laureates for the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine were announced; however, the committee was not aware that one of the laureates, Ralph M. Steinman, had died three days earlier. The committee was debating about Steinmans prize, since the rule is that the prize is not awarded posthumously.The committee later decided that as the decision to award Steinman the prize was made in good faith, it would remain unchangedRecognition time lagNobels will provides for prizes to be awarded in recognition of discoveries made during the preceding year. Early on, the awards usually recognised recent discoveries.55 However, some of these early discoveries were later discredited. For example, Johannes Fibiger was awarded the 1926 Prize for Physiology or Medicine for his purported discovery of a parasite that caused cancer.56 To avoid this embarrassment, the awards increasingly recognised scientific discoveries that had withstood the test of time.According to Ralf Pettersson, former chairman of the Nobel Prize Committee for Physiology or Medicine, the criterion the previous year is interpreted by the Nobel Assembly as the year when the full impact of the discovery has become evident.The interval between the award and the accomplishment it recognises varies from discipline to discipline. The Literature Prize is typically awarded to recognise a cumulative lifetime body of work rather than a single achievement.The Peace Prize can also be awarded for a lifetime body of work. For example 2008 laureate Martti Ahtisaari was awarded for his work to resolve international conflicts.However, they can also be awarded for specific recent events. For instance, Kofi Annan was awarded the 2001 Peace Prize just four years after becoming the Secretary-General of the United Nations.Similarly Yasser Arafat, Yitzhak Rabin, and Shimon Peres received the 1994 award, about a year after they successfully concluded the Oslo Accords.Although Nobels will stated that prizes should be awarded for contributions made during the preceding year, awards for physics, chemistry, and medicine are typically awarded once the achievement has been widely accepted. Sometimes, this takes decades for example, Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar shared the 1983 Physics Prize for his 1930s work on stellar structure and evolution. Not all scientists live long enough for their work to be recognised. Some discoveries can never be considered for a prize if their impact is realised after the discoverers have died.3 PrizesMedalsIt was announced on 30 May 2012 that the Nobel Foundation had awarded the contract for the production of the five (Swedish) Nobel Prize medals to Svenska Medalj AB. Formerly, the Nobel Prize medals were minted by Myntverket (the Swedish Mint) in between 1902-2010. Myntverket, Swedens oldest company, ceased operations in 2011 after 1017 years. In 2011 the Mint of Norway, located in Kongsberg, made the medals. The Nobel Prize medals are registered trademarks of the Nobel Foundation.Each medal features an image of Alfred Nobel in left profile on the obverse. The medals for physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, and literature have identical obverses, showing the image of Alfred Nobel and the years of his birth and death. Nobels portrait also appears on the obverse of the Peace Prize medal and the medal for the Economics Prize, but with a slightly different design. For instance, the laureates name is engraved on the rim of the Economics medal.The image on the reverse of a medal varies according to the institution awarding the prize. The reverse sides of the medals for chemistry and physics share the same design.All medals made before 1980 were struck in 23 carat gold. Since then they have been struck in 18 carat green gold plated with 24 carat gold. The weight of each medal varies with the value of gold, but averages about 175 grams (0.39 lb) for each medal. The diameter is 66 millimetres (2.6 in) and the thickness varies between 5.2 millimetres (0.20 in) and 2.4 millimetres (0.094 in). Because of the high value of their gold content and tendency to be on public display, Nobel medals are subject to medal theft. During World War II, the medals of German scientists Max von Laue and James Franck were sent to Copenhagen for safekeeping. When Germany invaded Denmark, chemist George de Hevesy dissolved them in aqua regia, to prevent confiscation by Nazi Germany and to prevent legal problems for the holders. After the war, the gold was recovered from solution, and the medals re-cast.DiplomasNobel laureates receive a diploma directly from the hands of the King of Sweden or the Chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee. Each diploma is uniquely designed by the prize-awarding institutions for the laureates that receive them.The diploma contains a picture and text which states the name of the laureate and normally a citation of why they received the prize. None of the Nobel Peace Prize laureates has ever had a citation on their diplomas.Award moneyThe laureates are given a sum of money when they receive their prizes, in the form of a document confirming the amount awarded.The amount of prize money depends upon how much money the Nobel Foundation can award each year. The purse has increased since the 1980s, when the prize money was 880 000 SEK (c. 2.6 million SEK, US$350 000 or 295,000 today). In 2009, the monetary award was 10 million SEK (US$1.4 million, 950,000). In June 2012, it was lowered to 8 million SEK.98 If there are two laureates in a particular category, the award grant is divided equally between the recipients. If there are three, the awarding committee has the option of dividing the grant equally, or awarding one-half to one recipient and one-quarter to each of the others. It is not uncommon for recipients to donate prize money to benefit scientific, cultural, or humanitarian causes.4 Oversea Chinese laureatesNobel Prize in Physics李政道 杨振宁 丁肇中 朱棣文 崔琦Nobel Prize in Chemistry 李远哲Nobel Prize in Literature高行健 5 Nobel peace Prize and politics The Nobel Peace prize is one of the worlds most prestigious awards, but it is also one of the most contentious.The Peace prize was set up with clear goals: the award would be given to those who have done the most for fraternity between nations, the abolition or r